


If I Die Before I Wake...

by josephina_x



Category: DCU (Comics), Teen Titans (Comics)
Genre: (and), (except not) - Freeform, Angst, Card Games, Clones, Crack, Crack Treated Seriously, Fluff, Fluff and Crack, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-07
Updated: 2015-11-07
Packaged: 2018-04-30 10:15:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,391
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5159990
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/josephina_x/pseuds/josephina_x
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Conner, alive again, has a talk with Tim about what he's been doing post-Infinite Crisis in the basement of Titans Tower...</p>
            </blockquote>





	If I Die Before I Wake...

**Author's Note:**

> Title: If I Die Before I Wake...  
> Author: [josephina_x](http://josephina-x.dreamwidth.org)  
> Fandom: DCU, Teen Titans  
> Pairing: Conner/Tim  
> Rating: G  
> Spoilers: up through Final Crisis (I play a little hard-and-fast with who the TT team members are, though)  
> Word count: ~2400  
> Summary: Conner, alive again, has a talk with Tim about what he's been doing post-Infinite Crisis in the basement of Titans Tower...  
> Warnings: Unbeta'd.  
> Disclaimer: Not mine, not-for-profit.
> 
> AN1: Yet another comment-fic, finally copied from its thread, and edited for your enjoyment! (Originally written/posted 2011-10-03. ...So, yes, before the DCnU explicitly showed Superboy learning through a simulated reality. Not entirely sure how they did it with DCU!Superboy, actually, erm... I'm assuming/think it was factoids and subconscious programming.)
> 
> \o/ to [elf](http://elf.dreamwidth.org) for the totally awesome prompt!
> 
> Original comment post thread lives [here](http://fic-promptly.dreamwidth.org/85194.html?thread=4077770#cmt4077770).
> 
> Prompt: "DCU, Tim/Kon, Tim successfully cloned Kon while he was dead (possibly more than once), and now the original Kon is back and he has two (or more) boyfriends to deal with."
> 
> Note the divergence here is in that Tim did not give up trying to clone Conner after Cassie discovered what he was doing, and the relationship is Tim/Kon and one-sided unrequited Cassie->Kon here.
> 
> Originally posted to (LJ and) DW on (2011-12-31 and) 2011-10-03 here: ([LJ link](http://josephina-x.livejournal.com/12798.html) and) [DW link](http://josephina-x.dreamwidth.org/809.html).

~*~*~*~*~*~

"You cloned me!"

"Conner--"

"You _cloned_ me?!?"

"Kon--"

"You _cloned me!!!_ "

Tim sighed, pulled the cowled hood back, and tried again. "Kon--"

Apparently his boyfriend was finally over the initial shock, rounding on him. " _You cloned me!_ Do you have any idea how stupid--?! You _do_ remember Match, right?"

"Technically, I wasn't trying to clone you, I was starting from the original DNA sources."

"...I don't even want to _know_ how you managed that," Conner stated flatly. He turned back to the vertical tube-incubator-thing that he half-remembered from nightmares of drowning and looked at... himself, but not himself, looking for all the world to be asleep but perpetually on the verge of waking. "Seriously, what the hell?"

Tim stared half at the floor, watching Conner out of the edges of his peripheral vision uncertainly.

"I mean, yeah, I've got a great bod and all, but you couldn't find another fuckbuddy? Cassie probably would have..." He stopped with a feeling of utter horror. "Oh god, Cassie. Has she been down here? You, you didn't let her... _use_..." He squicked out.

"No! God, Conner, I wasn't gonna share--" at Kon's glare he amended, realizing how that sounded. "I was missing a lot, and she tracked me down here. Made me promise to stop."

"But you didn't," Conner said darkly.

"I was going to bring you back!" Tim shouted.

"That is not me! That could never be me! I have a soul!" Kon was yelling, half in tears. Tim believed in God and all that, he wasn't the cold-mad-science type -- that was part of what was scaring him, that Tim was usually very repressed and noncommunicative at the best of times, and that maybe Kon didn't know his boyfriend even as well as he thought he had. To think that he hadn't believed Raven when she'd said Conner had a soul, all his own... Conner didn't know what to think, but he was pretty sure that letting it out was gonna involve a liberal use of TTK and a _lot_ of broken lab equipment.

"I know!" Tim shouted back, bringing Kon to a shocked, screeching halt. "I know you have a soul, I was _counting_ on it!" He started pacing, running his fingers nervously through his hair. "I know there are ways to get back a soul, through magic or prayer or whatever. I had _plans_ , ok?! But I needed a body to hold your soul and your memories first! It wasn't going to work if you didn't have a body, and that one--" he pointed at Kon's chest "--was totally trashed. I couldn't get it to function. It was too broken, and you were dead too long." Tim was so stressed that he was almost whimpering at this point. Kon stepped forward and wrapped him up in a hug.

"Ok, ok. Just... calm down a sec, ok?" Conner was feeling a little mollified from Tim's half-explanation, crazy as it was: people weren't like computers, you couldn't swap out a body like a spare hard drive, and if Tim had been thinking that way, then he must've been living seriously on the edge with his brain stuck in the bits and bytes and math stuff trying to figure him out. His body out. Plus, Tim didn't usually freak out like this, and it was starting to freak Conner out a little.

"I, I missed you, ok? I just wanted you back," Tim mumbled into his shirt in a troubled voice. "Please don't be mad?"

Conner sighed. "You couldn't just wait? You've got that whole religion-faith thing, right?" Conner was never really sure how he fell out on the issue himself, and he didn't really remember any in-between, but Tim was different. "Couldn't you, I dunno, have faith that stuff was gonna work out without you needing to go all Dr. Frankenstein on me?"

"Didn't want to wait. Could've been _years_ ," Tim quietly half-whined.

Conner huffed a quiet laugh into Tim's hair and smiled as he touched a light kiss to the top of his head. Tim might be a complete control freak, but at least he was _Kon's_ control freak.

"Ok already, I forgive you," Kon said, then frowned as Tim's desperate grip didn't loosen. He frowned a little. "Tim?"

"I don't know what to _do_ ," Tim shivered. "It's-- he's--" He looked up at Kon with fear in his eyes. "I got him right," he whispered.

"...So?" Kon asked, not really seeing the problem.

"I--" Tim looked so nervous. "I can't just... get rid of..." He shuddered at the thought. "He's you. He was supposed to be you. He could be a you."

"He could have been a me before you tried to stuff my soul into his body," Conner pointed out seriously, then instantly regretted it as soon as he saw the look on Tim's face. "Right. Forget I said that." He hugged Tim close again.

"...But what do I do?"

"What do _we_ do," Kon corrected firmly. He turned to look at the him-but-not-him in the tube again. "He woken up yet?"

"No."

"You run a training program on him or anything?"

Tim looked horrified all over again. "I wasn't going to hide any mental commands in your brain--!"

"Right --not what I meant, but ok."

Tim frowned up at him a little, not following his line of reasoning.

"I've got an idea. Let's go talk to Bart."

"Bart? Why--? Oh. _Oh._ We could help him grow up mentally in a virtual environment, to catch up to his physical body age. ...Why didn't I think of that?" Tim asked, cheeks burning a little red.

"Because you grew up normal?" 'And weren't thinking of him like a person until just now?' Kon didn't voice the latter, though -- it'd just upset Tim all over again, and it was obvious that his boyfriend hadn't exactly been taking care of himself, or getting enough sleep to function properly, and probably hadn't in a long time. Maybe even not since his death.

~*~*~*~*~*~

"Ok, that's it, time for an intervention! I don't know _what_ the three of you have been doing down here in Tim's creepy cave labs, but--" Cassie ground to a halt in shock.

Then she was nearly bowled over by Raven, Rose, Jaime, and Gar coming up the rear.

"What the hell--?" Gar started.

Tim, Bart, and what looked like two Kons were sitting in a circle on the floor, relaxing and playing crazy-eights. One of the Kons was dressed like Superboy, while the other was... sort-of dressed like Superboy: he was wearing a simple black leather jacket and black jeans with white sneakers, and a white t-shirt underneath. They all looked up at the sudden intrusion.

"Kon!" Jaime grinned excitedly. "I didn't know you had a twin!" Then he paused and said. "Dios mio, is that how you seem to get everywhere so fast?"

Bart laughed a little, while Conner shook his head and shot an annoyed look at his speedster friend. Tim looked a little nervous, while the other Kon looked amused.

"What. The. HELL. _TIM!!!_ " Cassie shrieked. "I told you -- _no more clones!_ "

Everybody new to the room backed away from Cassie slowly, looking confused. Even Rose's good eye widened quite a bit as she took a step back.

"Cass--" Conner began.

"No. You stay out of this," Cassie growled.

"-- _Excuse_ me?!" Conner started, really pissed off. As far as he was concerned, if _he_ was ok with it, what right did Cassie have to--? Conner stood up.

"...Would anybody believe me if I said I'd been teaching Conner how to do the making-doubles thing?" Bart said, standing and interjecting himself quickly.

"No," Cassie said with finality.

"Sorry dudes, I tried," Bart sighed as he dropped back down to sit on the floor.

"Cass--" Conner began again.

"You stay the hell away from me, you freak!" she hissed at him, backing up a step. "God, Tim, do you not _remember_ what happened with Match?"

Conner stood very very still. Bart's mouth dropped open. Rose looked absolutely shocked. Tim looked almost ill, and turned his head to look down at the floor.

The boy on the floor in the black and red-S t-shirt and blue jeans softly cleared his throat.

"Well, it's nice to finally know what you really think of me," he said.

Cassie turned and stared.

"That's Conner," he said, pointing to the boy standing up, wearing the leather jacket and white t-shirt. "I'm Terrence," he added, pointing to his own chest, right above the S-shield.

"You... really couldn't tell?" Rose asked Cassie in disbelief from behind her.

Cassie glanced back at the team misfit. "How could I... They just--!"

"He's been coming on missions with us every other day for the past week," Rose said slowly.

"...What?" Cassie said weakly.

Raven's eyebrows raised as she looked between the two Kryptonian-human hybrids. After a moment, she relaxed slightly. Then she realized something and gave a concerned look to Conner, but he just shrugged and gave her a small smile. She tilted her head upwards slightly to him in acknowledgment, then turned to Terrence with a smile and bowed her head to him in a small nod. He gave her a small rueful grin back.

Rose looked like she was trying to hold back a grim smirk. "I said, they've been pulling a Parent Trap on you for the last week-and-a-half. You remember when you were all surprised when Superboy showed up to help with the goo monster attacking Coast City? Conner really _was_ in school."

Cassie looked down at Terrence again. He smiled and shrugged back. She turned to Rose and accused, "You knew?!"

"Well, yeah, why do you think I took him aside after the mission to talk? Of course I asked what the hell was up."

"...Asked?" She shook her head and refocused. "Why didn't you just--!"

"What, accuse him in front of everybody of being some imposter and start up some dumb beatdown? 'Cause hey, I'm _all for_ more random violence, but we _do_ have Martian friends who like to shapeshift around sometimes, y'know." With a glance at Tim, she added with a little affection, "And Batfreaks who like to test 'situational awareness' and cover for people's secret identities without telling anyone else about it." When Cassie started to object again, she folded her arms and rolled her eye at her. "God, seriously?! He wasn't hurting anyone, he knew what he was doing, and he had a good reason for not 'fessing up. The hell is your problem? Get _over_ yourself already!"

Conner decided to try interjecting again. "He's not a clone of me, Cass. He's my brother. Not that it should matter," he said quietly, giving her a long look.

Cassie glanced between the two of them, again and again. Then she paled and looked up at Conner. "Conner, I'm sorry--"

He cut her off with a wave of his hand. "Don't apologize to me. Apologize to him."

"But--" Cassie wrapped her arms around her midsection, glanced over at Terrence again, then looked really lost.

"Geez, you'd think she'd be able to recognize her own teammates. Weren't the four of them together in Young Justice?" Rose softly griped to Jaime over by the entrance.

"I myself did not know," Raven pointed out as she and Gar drifted over to the small grouping, watching the rest.

"Yeah, but you try not to get into people's heads, emotions, whatever," Rose pointed out. "You can tell them apart when they're together, right?"

Raven slowly nodded. Gar tilted his head and watched. "Terrence seems a little more quiet, maybe a little more sarcastic?"

"What, only a _little_ more? Me and Bart obviously need to work on him more," Rose grinned.

"Um, why are we whispering over here again?" Jaime asked.

"We're trying not to disturb Little Miss Cranky Pants while Kon gets her hissy fit under control," she snarked happily.

"Oh. Uh, think anybody'll mind if I go say hi to Terrence? Uh, again? Playing cards sounds fun right about now."

"Go for it," Rose grinned, giving Jaime a friendly punch in the shoulder to send him off. The three of them watched him stumble over, then rub a hand behind his neck as he made an awkward reintroduction. Terrence smiled up at him and said something that had him laughing, then Jaime just plopped down and started up a new game with Bart and Terrence, while Cassie, Tim, and Conner continued their what looked to be far more awkward and grim discussion.

"So, I gotta ask..." Gar started.

"Eh, fine. Not like it's a secret. Terrence brought me down here after we got back and had cleaned up after the goo fight to show me stuff. Then Tim and Bart showed all mother-henning it up and we all had a little pow-wow. They didn't tell anyone because if anybody tried to say he was a threat when they couldn't tell them apart then they'd be saying Kon was a threat, too, and Superman would kick ass. They wanted him to have a chance to be himself without worrying about being watched or judged, to show everyone that he wasn't dangerous or anything." Rose stopped and smirked at that one before continuing -- that was something she could really appreciate. "He's a person. No weird Luthor programming or crazy shave-your-head-and-kill-'em-all influence. Tim had made him, or whatever. Bart programmed up the learning simulation for him, mostly, with a lot of input from Kon, and Tim just tweaked a few things to keep it all together. It's cool."

"You're sure?" Gar asked. Rose looked pleased and almost flattered that her judgment, for once, was not being questioned.

"Oh yeah. No worries. And hey, for a build-a-boy, he sure is damn hot, right?" she grinned.

"Uh..." Gar looked a little taken aback, but Raven's lips twitched in a slight smile. Rose waved them off and sauntered over to Terrence and the card game. The other three were still in hot discussion, having moved further off to the side for more privacy.

"You don't think..." Gar started.

"Rose _has_ always been interested in Kon," Raven pointed out lightly, with the barest trace of amusement.

"...Oy." Gar pinched the bridge of his nose. He felt a headache coming on. "Oh hell, what _are_ we going to tell the League?"

Raven patted him on back twice, soothingly.

~*~*~*~*~*~

**Author's Note:**

> AN2: ...aaaand there you are! This one was really fun -- thanks for the wonderful prompt, elf! :-D


End file.
